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Day #96: Dead Shadows (2012)

Ten years after his father murdered his mother on the night a comet passed near Earth, Chris lives on in fear of the dark. He tries to overcome his anxiety in order to attend an End of the World party as another comet passes over Paris, only to have to face his fears as the people around him start turning into monsters.

My take:

You may have thought that France only produced arthouse films, but Dead Shadows will quickly put that misconception to rest. In fact, its almost complete lack of artistry might just be groundbreaking for the French movie industry; but, if you’re able to quiet down your brain’s desire to understand what’s going on, well…it’s actually kind of entertaining.

Don’t mistake that for praise, because it’s not. In fact, the only thing that deserves any kind of praise is the work of the physical special effects team, because some (if not all) of that stuff looked pretty darn good. I kind of wish there’d been more of that, and less of the mostly bad CGI; or, on the flipside of that, more of the exceptionally rare good CGI. Either way.

Other than the pretty male lead*, I can’t really say that there was anything else to add to the “positives” list.

* Yes, I said *pretty*

The dialogue was awkward; the plot was holier than the Pope; and, for a movie that had zombie-esque people and some randomly placed people-turned-monsters, it managed to be completely devoid of anything approaching suspense, or horror. The audio also seemed to be really badly managed, sometimes to the point of distraction.

There’s just something so schlocky about the whole production, though, that I was just kind of, well…amused by it all. I couldn’t scrounge up the energy to feel annoyed, so instead I just watched with an eyebrow cocked in bemused entertainment.

Hell, if a sequel could produce the same response, I might even watch it. I’d just be sure to have some alcohol around, so this time I could come up with the drinking game that watching a movie like this clearly needs.